


Odds and Ends and Bric-a-Brac

by WriteOnMyWay



Category: The Terror (TV 2018), The Terror - Dan Simmons
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-06-12
Packaged: 2019-05-21 10:16:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14913500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WriteOnMyWay/pseuds/WriteOnMyWay
Summary: A collection of Hickey/Gibson drabbles.





	1. Chapter 1

There is an odd, infuriating and positively ridiculous similarity between himself and the ship he’d had the misfortune to board back in England. He notices the  _presence_  of this similarity quickly, as always, but can’t quite put his finger on it. When it finally dawns on him, he has to fight the urge to laugh as a raving lunatic he once passed on his way to the place he’d been calling “home” at that time.

“What is it?” Gibson asks, a childish curiosity surfacing in his pale eyes.

“Nothing.”

“No, it’s not. You just thought of something – I know this look of yours. What is it?”

He looks at Gibson who’s already smiling like a man who’s figured out that someone has a present for him – and is now impatient to get it. It’s a dangerous mood to be dealing with. Not that Gibson is going to have him executed or exiled if not given a gift, but trust is a thing more fragile than the finest china and infinitely more expensive. So he’ll tell the truth. He’ll just make it more digestible. Adding spices isn’t lying – ask any cook.

“You’re gonna laugh at me.”

Gibson encouragingly raises his eyebrows.

“I just thought that we’re in the same position. Us, I mean, and this ship. We’re not where we’re supposed to be.”

“Well, yeah, it’s no China.”

“I mean, in life. Don’t you see? This fucking ship is meant to sail, but it’s stuck in the ice and can’t do a thing about it. Now look at us. We are meant to live happily, but we’re stuck and can’t do shit.”

“That’s not true”, says Gibson after a thoughtful pause. “The ship can’t do anything because it’s a  _ship_. It’s pieces of wood, metal and cloth. But we’re  _men_. We’re alive. We don’t have to wait for wind and water to move us and for someone’s hand to steer us. We can do it ourselves.”

“Even here?” his tone is more sarcastic than he wanted.

“Even here”, Gibson whispers, stooping slightly to place a quick peck on his cheek. “Now I gotta go.”

He nods, his smile mirroring Gibson’s loving one, and rolls himself a cigarette.  _The Terror_ , for all he cares, can be crushed to splinters. But he’ll be damned if he allows it to happen to himself.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 34 - “I’m just looking out for you.”

Cornelius Hickey was like fire – unpredictable, beckoning, dangerous, irreplaceable. On a sunny day his hair shone like a distant beacon of old, showing the way home. His eyes could fill up with myriads of sparks when he laughed or remain ashen cold, devoid of any semblance of life.

 

A sharp tug on the lapels and Gibson all but stumbles, barely managing to keep his balance.

“Cornelius! What are you doing?”

 **“I’m just looking out for you”** , here they are, the sparks. “You’re so tall – you don’t want to hit your head, do you?”

The ship is cold like a grave and Hickey’s hands are warm and his breath burns like the fires of Hell and Gibson needs those fires to survive. Is that how you realize you are a true sinner?

“Penny for your thoughts”, Hickey’s smiling and his cheeks are rosy as if there are glowing embers hidden under his skin.

“I love you.”

It’s been a while since they saw a fly or a moth, but Gibson remembers what they look like when they fly towards a flame. He remembers the sounds they make, their tiny bodies colliding with the hard, unfeeling glass over and over again, their wings flapping and breaking. He feels like a moth, blinded and possessed.

The fire doesn’t kill him straight away, oh no. The fire – warm and soft and tender – envelops him, lulls him with a quiet confession of its own, breathes life into his very soul and leaves him gasping for air and abnormally hot. He wants more – and he gets it. He doesn’t hear the sound of his body crashing into an immovable wall. He doesn’t feel his arms and legs being broken. He doesn’t smell his own funeral pyre.

 

Cornelius Hickey was fire incarnate. And just like fire, he couldn’t help but kill.


End file.
